x, 239 pages : 22 cm

"Mediating Memory in the Museum is a contribution to an emerging field of research which is situated at the interface between memory studies and museum studies. It highlights the role of museums in the proliferation of the so-called memory boom as well as the influence of memory discourses on international trends in museum cultures. By looking at a range of museums in Germany, Britain, France and Belgium, which address a diverse spectrum of topics such as migration, difficult and dark heritage, war, slavery and the GDR, Arnold-de Simine outlines the paradigm shifts in exhibiting practices associated with the transformation of traditional history museums and heritage sites into 'spaces of memory' over the past thirty years. She probes the political and ethical claims of new museums and maps the relevance of key concepts such as 'vicarious trauma', 'secondary witnessing', 'empathic unsettlement', 'prosthetic memory' and 'reflective nostalgia' in the museum landscape"--

Includes bibliographical references and index

PARTI: MUSEUM -- MEMORY -- MEDIUM 1. A New Type of Museum? 2. Memory Boom, Memory Wars and Memory Crisis 3. Is There Such a Thing as 'Collective Memory'? 4. Media Frameworks of Remembering 5. Difficult Pasts, Vicarious Trauma: The Concept of 'Secondary Witnessing' 6. Empathy and its Limits in the Museum 7. Nostalgia and Post-Nostalgia in Heritage Sites PARTII: THE DEATHS OF OTHERS: REPRESENTING TRAUMA IN WAR MUSEUMS 8. Sites of Trauma 9.Icons of Trauma PART III: SCREEN MEMORIES AND THE 'MOVING' IMAGE: EMPATHY AND PROJECTION IN ISM, LIVERPOOL, AND IWM NORTH, MANCHESTER 10. The Politics of Empathy 11. Testimonial Video Installation 12. Middle Passage Installation 13. The Big Picture in IWM North 14. Guilt, Grief and Empathy PART IV: THE PARADOXES OF NOSTALGIA IN MUSEUMS AND HERITAGE SITES 15. (Post-)Nostalgia for the Museum? The Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford 16. The Ghosts of Spitalfields: 18 Folgate Street and 19 Princelet Street 17. Intangible Heritage, Place and Community: Ecomusee d'Alsace 18. Ostalgie -- Nostalgia for GDR Everyday Culture? The GDR in the Museum PART V: UNCANNY OBJECTS, UNCANNY TECHNOLOGIES 19. Phantasmagoria and its Spectres in the Museum

plus-circle Add Review

comment

Reviews